The European Commission, the legislative body of the EU, is now pushing to change asylum laws as the refugee and migrant crisis continues to test its strength.

CCTV’s Kevin Ozebek reports from Brussels.

European Commission seeks to change refugee laws amid crisis

European Commission seeks to change refugee laws amid crisis

The European Commission, the legislative body of the EU, is now pushing to change asylum laws as the refugee and migrant crisis continues to test its strength. CCTV's Kevin Ozebek reports from Brussels.

Greece has a huge burden on its hands. So far, this year more than 150,000 refugees and migrants have landed in that country. Because of current European Union asylum laws, it’s Greece’s role to process their asylum requests even if the asylum seekers have dreams of making it to western Europe. This is known as the Dublin Regulation.

“This is neither fair nor sustainable given the reality of volumes of people which has put a huge burden on just a few very number of member states,” Frans Timmermans, vice president of the European Commission said.

To ease that burden, commissioners have proposed two options to change the Dublin Regulation.

In the first option, the commission wants to add a “fairness clause” allowing law-allowing countries to call a crisis if it can’t handle the flood of refugee and migrant arrivals. For the second option, the commission wants to overhaul the current law by distributing refugees and migrants across Europe so each EU country would process it’s fair share.

While changing the Dublin Regulation won’t be an easy sell, refugee advocates are banking on the nations of Europe working together to ease the hardship of hundreds of thousands.